The Department of the Interior (DOI) has released its Final Report on a review of agency actions that are potentially burdensome to domestic energy production, in accordance with an executive order issued from President Donald Trump in March.

On August 29, Research Fellow H. Sterling Burnett was a guest on the Energy Matters to discuss how the G-20 Summit nations snub and isolate the United States for their decision to leave the Paris climate agreement.

Saving energy is not an appropriate goal for government regulation or even an important one. Energy is very important to modern civilization but it is just one of many commodities required by modern life.

Last month, HBO funnyman John Oliver spent an episode of his show Last Week Tonight delivering a profanity-laced rant demonizing coal, coal-energy advocates, and presidents of the United States who don coal-miner hard-hats.

Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis popularized the phrase “laboratories of democracy”: “(T)o describe how a ‘state may, if its citizens choose, serve as a laboratory; and try novel social and economic experiments without risk to the rest of the country.’”

Stories this week shed light on the often hidden high costs of both private sector (sort of private sector at least) and public sector efforts to promote renewable energy to fight climate change. Research shows climate commitments impose high energy costs on ratepayers and make the business climate less competitive — both trends that will only get worse if states pursue Paris.